


This Is Where the Dragons Went

by Zoya1416



Category: Discworld
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-14
Updated: 2015-03-14
Packaged: 2018-03-17 16:58:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3537080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zoya1416/pseuds/Zoya1416
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam Vimes reflects on history, and on story.</p><p>See my work  PETITIONS for further remembrances on Sir Terry.   <br/>archiveofourown.org/works/3577953</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Is Where the Dragons Went

"This is where the dragons went.

"They lie...  
Not dead, not asleep. Not waiting, because waiting implies expectation.  
Possibly the word we're looking for is...  
...dormant."

.............

Sam Vimes woke in the dark. Something had changed, and nothing had changed.

He lay awake on the large feather bed listening to Sybil snore gently. As he had many times before, he thought about how his life had gone since a band of plotters had decided that regime change was what Ankh-Morpork needed. He'd fought a dragon, rescued a fair maiden who weighed more than he did, and who rescued him right back.

Wonder of wonders, she'd married him and gave him, Sam Vimes of Cockbill Street, a child. A son. 

He'd stopped a war by arresting two armies, when he went down the wrong, or right, Trousers of Time.

He'd arrested the Patrician—and had been rewarded by the bastard with more titles than he ever wanted. He'd been there when Carrot had arrested a dragon. He'd defeated a monstrous werewolf who was resisting arrest. He'd found two stone kings, a dwarf and a troll, playing Thud in a cavern. They'd come to make peace, not war.

He'd been flung back in time, arrested a monster of a murderer, and taught his younger self how to be a copper.

But now...he was thinking that he should put on his armor, go outside, down to Pseudopolis Yard, rouse the watchmen, and fight...what? There were no more dragons to fight. Perhaps he'd seen a shadow of one, crossing the moon.

He should protect, defend, rescue...what? A tremor had awoken him, and Ankh-Morpork had no volcanoes. At least it hadn't when he went to bed. He squinted suspiciously at the sky, but it was as dark as the city ever got, no lava spilling out from some unexpected seam. Something had changed and nothing had changed. 

He rolled over in bed. Sybil had awoken, and he looked into her blue eyes.

He didn't know what he was going to say until he said it.

“Sybil, we have to go down to Small Gods tomorrow. We'll take some flowers—It's not time for lilacs, what can we take?”  
She nodded, not following his train of thoughts. “Who's died, Sam?”

“Someone. I don't know who, but we need to lay some flowers. What can we get now?”

She squinted. “Daffodils, I think. Crocuses? I'll check. Something that blooms in the earliest spring, anyway. Comes out when things seem dark.”

He leaned over to her and kissed her gently. “Good. That's good.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is where the dragons went...the little ones, swirling and squeaking and flashing with all colors, escorting Terry Pratchett to the door which opened into the dark desert and endless night. And Errol the whittle, and his Draco nobilis mate, came to escort him onwards from the Disc, into the totally unfathomable, star-dotted depths of space.


End file.
